Why I wrote a book about my experience of new motherhood

Plus details of upcoming book events

The highs and lows of becoming a new mother inspired my next book The Lifeline

I thought I knew what it would be like to become a new mother. I’d be exhausted, yes, but I’d also be ‘on cloud nine’ and in ‘the newborn bubble’, feeling a love ‘unlike anything’. That’s what I’d been led to expect by everything I’d ever read or watched about new motherhood.

So when my experience veered so far from the picture I had in my mind, my world was rocked. I didn’t feel euphoric and gushing. I felt broken and numb. And above all I felt ashamed. Because I had chosen to become a mother. And yet I didn’t feel at all how I thought a mother was supposed to feel.

I felt as if I was doing it all wrong. I thought I was all wrong. And I worried I was the only person who’d ever felt that way.

This feeling of being alone in my struggles is the thing that ultimately inspired me to write a novel drawing on that time in my life. Because now that I’m in a happier place where motherhood is still hard but is also fun and rewarding, I wanted to reflect back on my beginning as a mother. And to say wholeheartedly to anyone who had a rocky start that your beginning doesn’t define what comes next.

I’d love it if this book encouraged more open conversations about the tough parts of motherhood that we can often feel too guilty to talk about. If it offered a (pardon the pun) lifeline to those still struggling.

My son and I when he was a newborn, when we were getting to know one another and I was finding my feet as a mother

“If she is not enjoying it, cherishing it, then she is doing it all wrong.”

The Lifeline, Libby Page

Some of the ‘terrible’ thoughts I had as a new mother (that I now know are perfectly normal)

• Tiny babies are really boring. They don’t do anything!

• I’m not sure I love my baby yet. I only just met him!

• I miss my old life.

• I miss my old body.

• I miss my partner.

• Have I made a mistake?

My son is now nearly three and I can look back and say that the early stage was just the bit I had to get through to get to the good stuff. My initial fears and regrets have been replaced by joy, laughter and a deep ocean of love. More than just loving him I like him - he is funny and affectionate and loves to dance and read books. I didn’t know any of that when he was a tiny baby. I didn’t know him yet.

Something that didn’t help when I was struggling to adjust to motherhood were the well-meaning comments of strangers. ‘Cherish every moment’ was a phrase I heard frequently that made me feel worse when I was struggling. It felt hard enough to get us both through each day in one piece, let alone having to cherish it as well.

Now that my son is looking less like a baby and more like a child every day, I can see that this phrase comes from a good place, a place of love and of yearning to have back the child a parent loses when they become an adult. But it feels like a lot of pressure to put on a person whose world has just been turned upside down (and who likely is getting by on mere snatches of sleep).

In my book I delved into the way kindly-meant phrases like ‘cherish every moment’ can actually do more harm than good and tried to come up with a more realistic alternative that feels truer to my experience of parenting. Because while I can safely say I do not cherish tantrums and nappy-changes I do find something in every day to delight in, in a way I once couldn’t imagine.

“To be expected to savour every second of every day feels like being at a party that never ends, when you’re exhausted and want to just sit down but the music keeps playing and the lights keep flashing and you’re expected to keep dancing. But one moment? That feels doable.”

The Lifeline, Libby Page

My son and I by the river that inspired the location of The Lifeline

One of the things I found hardest about new motherhood was the feeling of isolation. I felt physically isolated - mostly at home with a newborn, often alone when my husband had to go back to work - but also disconnected from others by my feelings that I found hard to talk about at the time.

It’s that feeling of isolation that inspired me to centre The Lifeline around the friendships formed at a wild swimming group. Through my years as an outdoor swimmer (inspired by my first book The Lido) I have found wild swimming groups to be warm and welcoming spaces where people of all ages mix and where you quite quickly get to discussing the big things with people who started as strangers. Perhaps it’s something about undressing together that forces you to drop the pretences.

In The Lifeline I have written the book I wish I could have read when I was adjusting to new motherhood and felt as if I was bobbing about in a storm a long way from the shore. It is a book that doesn’t shy away from the hard aspects of becoming a mother - because I wish there had been more varied examples for me to draw from back then to make me realise I was not alone.

But it is also at its heart a hopeful, joyful book. It is about the people and the places that can pull you back from the edge, no matter what the reason that has led you there.

---

Don’t miss these upcoming events…

• If you live near my hometown of Frome (or are up for a trip!) then you are warmly invited to my book launch on Wednesday 24th April. There will be a reading from The Lifeline, a book signing and I will be fundraising for Frome Birth Talk, a charity that helped me when I was struggling as a new mother. A lot of the words of wisdom that my kind and supportive counsellor from the charity shared with me have ended up in the pages of The Lifeline.

• I’m delighted to be taking part in the Guildford Book Festival’s Spring Readers’ Day alongside a whole host of wonderful authors.

• And on 19th May I’m taking part in a very exciting event at Streatley on Thames, perfect for all the wild swimmers (or aspiring wild swimmers) amongst you. The event will start with an interview about my book and its themes of motherhood and wild swimming at The Boathouse at The Swan and will be followed by a group wild swim for all those who wish to join. I can’t wait!

And a few other things…

• The digital edition of The Lido is on sale for 99p until the end of the month. A perfect chance to read or re-read ahead of the launch of The Lifeline!

• I was recently interviewed about The Lifeline, writing and motherhood for the Better Words podcast in their ‘Re-Read’ category, because I first chatted to them about my second book The 24-Hour Café. You can listen to that original episode here.

• Have you pre-ordered The Lifeline? Pre-orders do so much to help books gain some buzz (and ultimately give them a better chance of success) so authors LOVE people who pre-order. And if you’d like to get a flavour for the book and missed it in a previous newsletter, you can read a free sample of the first chapter of The Lifeline here.